The Dangerous Escalation: US Military Actions in Venezuela and Caribbean Waters
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- 3 min read
Context and Background
The ongoing tensions between the United States and Venezuela have reached a critical juncture, with recent developments exposing a multifaceted pressure campaign that combines military action, economic measures, and covert operations. The retirement of the military commander who oversaw Pentagon strikes in Caribbean and Eastern Pacific waters comes amid unresolved questions about the nature and justification of these military actions. Simultaneously, the seizure of a Venezuelan oil tanker bound for Cuba reveals the complex economic dimensions of this confrontation, while the secret extraction of opposition leader María Corina Machado demonstrates the covert operational elements at play.
Factual Developments
The article reveals several interconnected developments that paint a troubling picture of US foreign policy in the region. The Pentagon has been conducting strikes on vessels in Caribbean and Pacific waters under the command of an admiral who has since retired without fully addressing fundamental questions about these operations. Intelligence indicates that the seized Venezuelan oil tanker was part of Caracas’s effort to support Cuba, with documentation showing Matanzas, Cuba as its intended destination.
In a separate but related development, an American firm with special operations experience executed a complex extraction operation to spirit Nobel Peace Prize recipient María Corina Machado out of Venezuela using land, sea, and air routes. This operation occurred within the context of Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s escalating military pressure campaign against Venezuela, which appears driven by dual objectives: removing Venezuela’s leadership while simultaneously dealing what Rubio has long sought—a critical blow to Cuba’s interests.
Perhaps most disturbingly, research highlighted in the article indicates that US troops involved in these questionable maritime strikes risk suffering “moral injury”—deep psychological harm resulting from participation in missions they perceive as wrong or unjustified. This psychological trauma represents a human cost rarely discussed in geopolitical calculations.
The Erosion of Democratic Principles
This multifaceted campaign against Venezuela represents a dangerous departure from America’s professed commitment to democratic norms and international law. The use of military force against vessels in international waters, without clear justification or transparency, undermines the very principles of sovereignty and rule of law that the United States claims to uphold globally. The retirement of the commanding admiral without proper accountability for these strikes suggests an alarming lack of oversight and responsibility within our military command structure.
The seizure of the Venezuelan oil tanker bound for Cuba raises serious questions about America’s respect for economic sovereignty and freedom of navigation. While the US may disagree with Venezuela’s political leadership, using economic warfare to punish nations for their trade relationships sets a dangerous precedent that could easily be turned against American interests elsewhere. This approach echoes the worst excesses of interventionist foreign policy that have historically damaged America’s moral standing internationally.
The Human Cost of Questionable Missions
The psychological impact on American service members deserves particular attention. The concept of “moral injury”—when troops suffer deep psychological harm from participating in missions they perceive as ethically wrong—represents a profound betrayal of the men and women who serve our nation. Our military personnel swear to defend the Constitution and American values, not to become instruments of questionable geopolitical maneuvering that may violate their moral conscience.
This administration has a sacred responsibility to ensure that every mission assigned to American troops is morally defensible, legally justified, and strategically necessary. The fact that research confirms psychological risks for personnel involved in these Caribbean operations suggests a failure of leadership at the highest levels. We are potentially creating a generation of veterans who will carry not just physical wounds from combat, but deep psychological scars from being ordered to execute missions that conflict with their understanding of right and wrong.
The Rubio Factor and Regional Implications
Secretary Rubio’s personal longstanding ambition to strike at Cuba through Venezuelan policy represents exactly the type of personalized foreign policy that the framers of our Constitution sought to prevent. Foreign policy should serve national interests, not individual politicians’ decades-old grudges or ideological fixations. The blending of personal ambition with national security decision-making creates dangerous incentives for escalation and undermines the careful, deliberate approach that international relations require.
The regional implications of this aggressive stance cannot be overstated. Latin American nations watching US actions against Venezuela will rightly question whether sovereignty means anything when confronting American power. This approach risks driving regional partners toward other global powers and undermines decades of careful diplomacy building partnerships based on mutual respect rather than coercion.
A Call for Return to Principles
As a nation founded on principles of liberty, sovereignty, and democratic governance, the United States must hold itself to the highest standards of international conduct. Military force should be an absolute last resort, deployed only when clear national security interests are at stake and with proper congressional authorization. Covert operations to extract political figures, while sometimes necessary in extreme circumstances, must be subject to rigorous oversight and clear ethical guidelines.
The current approach to Venezuela appears to lack strategic coherence, ethical clarity, and respect for the institutional processes that safeguard both American values and international stability. We must return to a foreign policy that respects sovereignty, values diplomatic engagement, and recognizes that true influence comes from moral leadership rather than military coercion. The men and women of our military deserve missions they can believe in, our international partners deserve consistency and respect, and the American people deserve a foreign policy that reflects our nation’s highest ideals rather than its most cynical impulses.
The retirement of the admiral overseeing these operations without answering fundamental questions about their nature and justification represents an accountability failure that Congress must address. Meanwhile, the psychological wellbeing of our troops and the stability of our hemisphere hang in the balance, demanding immediate course correction toward principles-based statesmanship.